Conventional sealed electrical connectors to which the invention is principally directed usually include mating male and female connector halves having therein one or more sockets adapted to receive, respectively, male and female cable lead terminations. When the connector halves are together, the male and female terminals secured to the cable leads are in mating engagement to form therebetween an electrical connection. It is desirable in such connectors that the electrical connection or connections be sealed from external environmental factors. This is obtained by the cable seals which effectively seal the terminals in their respective connector cavities. Such cable seals normally are secured to the ends of the cable leads by the terminals. A preferred type of cable seal includes plural sealing rings which, when the cable lead termination is received in the socket, engage the socket wall to effect therewith a seal.
Heretofore, the cable seals have been molded by well-known transfer molding techniques. After cure of the cable seals in the transfer mold, the cable seals would be ejected individually from the mold and collected by suitable means in containers for subsequent handling. Because the cable seals more or less would free-fall from the mold after ejection from the mold cavity, the same would be received in the container in a disorientated or random manner for subsequent handling and use. Hence, the cable seals would be delivered at a cable termination assembly site in a jumbled manner for subsequent assembly in the cable lead terminations.
In the manufacture of cable lead terminations, automatic assembly equipment has been employed for stripping the ends of the insulated cable leads and for crimping the terminals to the stripped ends of the cable leads. However, it has been a necessary practice because the cable seals are presented at the assembly site in a disorientated manner to handle manually each individual cable seal between automatic stripping and crimping of the cable leads and terminals, respectively. Prior assembly practices for example included manually orientating the cable seals in a jig and subsequently manually inserting therein the stripped ends of the insulated cable leads. Such assembly practices add significantly to labor costs, are extremely time consuming and laborious for the laborer, and tend to increase the idle time of automatic assembly equipment.